Tag Archives: Enact Systems

ENACT SYSTEMS, an end-to-end business process automation platform for distributed solar projects, is integrating two new preferred financing partners to its cloud software platform for solar project developers, installers, and distributors in the U.S. market.

PACEfunding

PACEfunding is a specialty finance company that provides financing to homeowners for upgrades such as solar energy, energy efficiency, and water conservation. PACEfunding’s residential property assessed clean energy (PACE) loans are authorized by the CSCDA Open PACE program. This financing is now fully integrated into ENACT’s PACE platform, developed in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Energy SunShot Initiative.

“PACE financing can be made more efficient, and we are leading the movement to provide the most attractive residential PACE user experience for contractors and homeowners in California. Integrating our offering with the ENACT Platform further improves both our own efficiency and the contractor user experience. Plus, ENACT provides a growing eco-system of solar installers that now can offer financing to homeowners very easily”, said Robert Giles, CEO of PACEfunding, based in Los Gatos, CA.

Commercial PPAs

The second financing partner, not named in the announcement, brings a broad range of commercial solar PPA finance offerings to the ENACT platform: attractive pricing for project sizes as low as 100 kilowatts, in all 50 U.S. states as a special program for ENACT Platform users.

“We are focused on partnering with the leading financing providers for both residential and commercial projects, so our platform users have the best financing options already integrated to their proposal and workflow process,” said Deep Chakraborty, CEO of ENACT SYSTEMS.

The two new preferred financing partners will join five existing fund partners on the ENACT platform. The ENACT platform integrates fund access for solar project installers and developers, making transactions more efficient, helping to reduce soft costs for all platform users. The platform reduces the time for developers and installers to quote, sell, and close deals as well as manage their installation process.

Enact Systems provides a cloud-based end-to-end business process automation solutions for distributed energy developers, installers, investors as well as utilities and energy co-operatives. The company’s latest partnership with West Monroe Partners will be a strategic implementation in the U.S. utility industry.

“A number of our utility clients are looking to launch internal capabilities to service their residential and commercial customers with distributed energy solutions like solar and energy storage,” said David South, Senior Principal of the utility practice for West Monroe Partners. “As we advised our clients through this process, we saw a significant need for more automation in the sales, financing and operations management processes where Enact fits the clear need.”

Enact and West Monroe work together to define best practices for rapid deployment of distributed energy programs leveraging the Enact Cloud to provide new levels of automation and advantage, including:

“We are excited to be partnering with West Monroe on building core software and data analytics capabilities that are in high demand for the rapidly growing distributed solar marketplace,” said Matt Cheney, Executive Chairman of Enact Systems. “US Energy Utilities and Co-operatives are navigating strategic shifts in the energy landscape as they evaluate new distributed energy program offerings for their customer base. West Monroe and Enact are positioned strongly to support such market needs.”

Enact Systems, an end-to-end business automation software platform for distributed energy, has been awarded two cooperative grants from the U.S. Department of Energy SunShot Initiative. The two awards, add up to $1.64 million over 18 months with requirements for cost sharing by ENACT. The company’s software-as-service platform is a leading business automation solution for reducing distributed energy soft costs and providing both users and customers quick access to financing.

Operational analytics

The first award of $650,000 is to develop a suite of Operational Analytics for Solar Business Operations. Enact says this end-to-end, operational workflow analytics module will further expedite sales of solar photovoltaic projects for its users. Live workflow analytics can enable solar developers and installers to more efficiently manage their projects and gain valuable guided insights in real-time. The analytics will illustrate every step of a user’s workflow process for sales and operations and benchmark all process steps and related costs on a real-time basis. This suite of operations management capabilities allows companies to manage their entire workflow for design and installation, by allowing them to configure process steps for documentation and tasks at a company user level.

PACE platform

The second award of $1 million is to develop a Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) Solar Accelerator platform (PSA). This platform aims to provide solar contractors and developers with end-to-end platform functionality for automation of sales, design and financing of projects utilizing operations, pricing and underwriting processes leveraging PACE financing. PACE program administrators and lenders across the country can also have access and benefit from the platform through seamless access to deal flow from solar contractors and developers.

In addition, the PSA solution automates document management for program financing approvals including the quoting requirements for successful PACE transactions. The result is the acceleration of sales and financing volumes, coupled with a reduction of transaction costs associated with origination, underwriting, financing and overall administration, leading to an improved ease of adoption and use of PACE as a financing solution.

“We are excited to be partnering with the DOE on building core software and data analytics capabilities that are in high demand for the rapidly growing solar marketplace,” said Deep Chakraborty, CEO of Enact Systems. “We share SunShot Initiative’s goal of mass adoption of solar and are striving to develop key operational and financing tools to accelerate that adoption. These new platforms will help users further reduce solar transaction costs, while enabling new customers and other important stakeholders to benefit directly from the rapidly expanding solar playing field.”

SunShot investments have sought to drive technology innovations that contribute to a significant drop in the cost of solar in the U.S. and increase deployment nationwide. Sunshot’s goal is to achieve a solar levelized-cost-of-energy (LCOE) of subsidy-free $0.06 per kilowatt hour (kWh) by 2020.

Industry experts have noted that as the cost to install solar continues to fall, consumers are demanding financial options that support ownership instead of leasing.

“PPAs (power purchase agreements) and leases are declining in popularity, and loans are rapidly gaining ground among savvy consumers. Credit-union backed loan products with contractor-friendly processes and best-in-class servicing teams, like Sungage’s, are in high demand,” said ENACT Co-Founder and CEO Deep Chakraborty.

To that end, ENACT Systems, a provider of web-based distributed energy sales software, and Sungage Financial, a financial solutions provider for the residential solar industry, have formed a partnership to enable installers to have easy access to Sungage’s financing products through ENACT’s distributed energy sales and financing workflow automation platform. The low-interest loans, ranging in term from 5 to 20 years, offer homeowners flexibility and affordability. Under this partnership, Sungage and ENACT are offering an on-line and streamlined application process which allows homeowners to receive credit decisions in minutes.

Visitors to Solar Power International (SPI), held in Anaheim, Calif. (Sept. 14-17), can visit ENACT Systems at booth #228 to demo its software and this new integrated financing solution with Sungage Financial.

What else is going on at SPI (besides everything?)

ENACT’s collaboration with Sungage Financial expands on the company’s mission to incorporate best-in-class financing options into its offerings for the distributed energy ecosystem. Remember this collaboration Quicken Loans? Using the ENACT web-based platform, installers can reduce operating costs while accelerating revenue growth, allowing them to scale faster. The platform also enables the ability to reduce soft costs associated with customer acquisition, operations and financing, track and report sales and finance pipelines, as well as improve internal team collaboration.

“By using the ENACT platform, installers can reduce their costs as well as increase their productivity and sales efficiency,” said Sara Ross, Co-Founder and CEO of Sungage. “Making installers more profitable and effective in the marketplace is core to Sungage’s mission. We are thrilled to offer our financial products to homeowners through ENACT’s installer user base and software as a service platform.”

Meeting demand within the solar, energy efficiency and other distributed energy markets, ENACT Systems and RapidAdvance have partnered to offer working capital to energy services contractors using ENACT’s distributed energy sales and financing workflow automation platform. Called “Quick Working Capital” the solution allows ENACT users with growing project pipelines for distributed energy projects access to loans, cash advances and lines of credit from $5,000 to $500,000, within 72 hours of application, with limited paperwork.

“Residential and commercial solar and energy retrofit projects have long sales and installation cycles, and contractors often limit their growth potential due to slow cash-flow. Through our partnership with RapidAdvance now, contractors can unlock rapid access to working capital funds, based on their business pipeline on ENACT,” said Deep Chakraborty, ENACT co-founder and CEO.

“ENACT is committed to advancing the distributed energy marketplace, especially for regional and local installers,” said Mark Cerminaro, chief revenue officer of RapidAdvance. “We’re excited to be partnering with ENACT to bring greater financial predictability and stability to its growing installer base.”